


Passing Strangers

by shortwavemystery



Category: Ultravox - Fandom
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-01
Updated: 2020-12-01
Packaged: 2021-03-10 00:15:26
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,548
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27815176
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shortwavemystery/pseuds/shortwavemystery
Summary: 1979: Ultravox are getting the band back together, and their prospective new frontman makes a great "first impression" on the bassist.
Relationships: Midge Ure/Chris Cross





	Passing Strangers

Chris liked him much more than Dennis already. He hadn’t exactly been enamoured, and it could well be something different when, or if, they actually played music together, but he'd agreed with Warren that it made sense to try and get to know him on a personal level first. Hit some bars, carouse, and just have a good time. Yes, he seemed much more level-headed than old Dennis, down to earth, more like a normal guy you could actually be friends with. He had some humility, but tempered it with a decent helping of honest, get-it-done confidence--the perfect recipe for personal magnetism. Any frontman type had to have a bit of an ego, but at least Billy's new friend seemed like a member of the human race.

And now, he was a human being who was drunkenly bumming around in Chris's apartment, at an absolutely ungodly hour. It was easy to pity him, as everyone else did--Scottish lad who picked up everything and moved to London, caught in a whirl of excitement over some trendy boy-band silliness that obviously wouldn't last forever. Woefully unprepared, but in a romantic manner, at least. Chasing after a big dream. One sympathized. Especially anyone who was passionate about music...how could you summon the nerve to be in some sort of rock band without a touch of that idealism? The fact that he needed a place to stay was part of the deal with Midge, and not a terribly burdensome one. After all, it wasn't like Chris was bringing "guests" back terribly often these days. He thought it was a bit unusual that Midge wouldn't want to room with Billy, considering they'd known each other longer and all, but he also knew his own charms. After all, hadn't Billy and Warren and Dennis all taken a liking to him quickly, laughing at his zinging jokes and patting him on the back like an old buddy, seemingly in no time? 

But whatever his motivations were, Midge had decided to sit on the edge of Chris's bed, already acting rather like he owned the place. How ironic.

"It's getting pretty late, innit?" offered Chris, eyeing those cumbersome bags he was evidently not in the right mind to unpack. If he wanted to sleep in his clothes his first night here, that would have to be his problem.

"I know," came the begrudging reply, accompanied by a perfunctory check of the wristwatch. Midge rubbed his eyes a bit, calling attention to his reddened complexion. In his days as a teen heartthrob, they'd bathed him in makeup, but he was actually a bit freckled, especially in this light...those Celtic genes.

But more importantly, he wasn't taking the hint. Too drunk to notice? Too drunk to care? Chris decided to sit down on the bed himself, to make the point a little more clear. "Well, if you know it's late, why not call it a night? You remember where the couch is, right?" He found himself staring at those bags again, those bags Midge had clearly positioned near his bed, in what could only be delirium.

Midge looked at him as though he'd told a very funny joke, perhaps his best one of the entire evening. Chris wasn't laughing. But that look, with a wry smile and coyly raised eyebrows, had a magnetic quality that almost made him feel bad for being so irritated. 

Midge went ahead and threw his arm around Chris's shoulders, seemingly expressing more of that alehouse camaraderie. There was something unconscious or instinctual about it. In vino veritas, perhaps...if that affection ran deeply, it would certainly be convenient, and point towards their compatibility playing together. But Chris was exhausted, and now wasn't the time to be waxing lyrical about it. He tried to give that wandering arm a polite push, but it had some real heft behind it, as well as intent.

"Oh, come on," he half-whispered to Chris, a few inches from his face. His breath had an unpleasant tinge of drink to it, and he seemed to speak as though what he was asking for should be blatantly obvious. Chris felt his other hand creep up one of his thighs, again, with a very deliberate kind of pressure in his touch.

Chris stood up from the bed with a start, feeling a sudden pit in his stomach, and a visceral sense of disgust. "Oh, is that it?" he spat. "You're one of...you're like that, are you? I'll send you right back out that door, and then--"

Yes, and then, Midge would probably end up staying with Billy, and if he and Warren were so fond of him, they'd probably go on without him, wouldn't they? He could tell them anything he wanted about what happened, or didn't happen, tonight, and he couldn't prove anything. Surely, that wouldn't be worth it...especially not for what might have been a drunken misread of a situation. Now, Midge was looking up at him with eyes full of worry and regret, like a child who's been caught stealing change from his mother's purse. It was hard not to pity him, the way it twisted that full-cheeked "baby face." But he wasn't denying anything. Perhaps he wasn't in a mental state to formulate a coherent explanation...but he also wasn't trying.

Midge sighed deeply, putting his head in his hands. The same hands that had just gotten thrown back at him. An expression of culpability? "I'm sorry," he mumbled. "I just thought...the way you looked at me...you said I could come back here, and…"

Chris let himself get closer again, and sat back down. It was hard to make out what he was getting at--that thick Glaswegian accent was practically stereotypical, and the boozy slurring only muddled it more. It didn't sound like much meaning was buried in there, at least not in any words themselves, but it had all the tones of a rueful apology.

"Listen, it's not a big deal. It doesn't have to be a big deal," offered Chris, attempting to look him in the face despite the fact that it was still buried in his hands. "I'm sure it's hard sometimes, being…" For a moment he looked askance, searching for the right words. "I'm sure you don't know sometimes, or you don't know what to do with yourself, and...you don't feel safe. I'm sure it can be scary, and it's dangerous…"

At last, Midge sat upright again and built up the courage to look Chris in the eye. He looked simultaneously very relieved at his reassurances, but still full of trepidation. His eyes had that odd quality, thought Chris, of being very dark blue, the kind that almost look brownish until you see them at the right angle. They had a certain vulnerability, but never totally relinquished control. It was a handsome quality. 

"You don't always find people who try and understand it," Midge offered ruefully. "It means a lot. In Glasgow, it was one thing--any wrong move and people will pick a fight with you. And when you're a little guy, you're already starting from a bad place. I'd always hoped that a place like this was home to a more...enlightened kind." (Didn't those words sound bewitching with a Celtic lilt?) "It really doesn't have to mean anything special, anything different, than it does when I meet a girl, and she makes me laugh, and…"

"Don't worry about it," Chris offered brusquely, eliminating the need for further elaboration. "Really. Don't. You're right, and I'm the one who should have apologized. I could have been more polite...but you surprised me, that's all. Just surprised. It's not even, necessarily, that…"

Chris saw him turn his head with interest, raising his eyebrows, picking up the devilish thought he hadn't really said, but that still lay twisted inside his words. That was a skill one needed when one was involved in this sort of business...reading things written in invisible ink. But it wasn't like that for him. At least, not really. Maybe he tended to see fewer girls he fancied than other guys, maybe he'd had a bit less experience, and maybe, from time to time, he'd thought about certain things, but it didn't have to mean...anything important about him. But it didn't have to be important, now did it? Denial and guilt wormed around each other in his throat.

"Forget I said anything," offered Chris, with a sigh. "Just forget it, we'll go to bed and it'll all be fine in the morning." As a gesture of further reassurance, he rested his hand on Midge's shoulder, more or less unconsciously. Oops. He withdrew it quickly, touching the back of his neck instead. He felt his face flushing. The jig was up. Midge was eyeing him again, this time with a fetching grin that said more than any slurred speech could. He knew too much, at this point. In fact, he knew everything. He had actual experience with this sort of thing...and Chris was no match for him.

With nothing left to hide, and no point left in arguing, Chris decided to wipe that smile off his face for good. He leaned in, as swiftly as he could, for a kiss on the lips, attempting to at least keep a bit of surprise on his side. He was about as well received as could be, by a pair of lips that tasted strongly of alcohol, as well as by those hands. He felt one of them brazenly crawling up the side of his torso, and the other, rather tenderly, caressing his cheek...oh, how it felt to be wanted so badly by someone. It had his heart racing, and his breath stuttering. He'd always been the amiable type, going along with others, rolling with whatever his friends wanted him to do. It was no wonder it was rough approaching girls, when one's temperament was like that. Perhaps being the quarry would be more his style. 

Midge's hands untied the silky scarf around his neck, and it was hard not to shudder as he felt the delicate material moving over his throat, directed, for the first time, by hands that weren't his own. His hands were rough--callused in places, of course, from playing that guitar--and completely unlike a woman's. The shape and mould and strength of them was something he'd never felt before, and something he never even knew to consider. 

Now, those capable hands had ventured between the buttons on his shirt, sliding in and grazing the edges of his ribs, teasing one of his nipples and then the other. Equally emboldened, Midge made more and more advances with his tongue, teasing, tempting, toying...it was almost too much. He sat there nearly frozen, partly enjoying being the focus of such attention, and partly too nervous to embark on any risky endeavours. 

Midge pulled away from his lips, planting kisses down the side of his neck. The edge of his face was rough and almost scratchy, something else Chris didn't anticipate about being with another man. He slipped Chris's shirt down over his shoulders and off of his hairy arms, tossing it aside without much concern, just like he had with the scarf. Even now that he'd come up for air after that kiss, Chris kept his eyes closed demurely, not for fear or dread but rather a simple shyness. 

As Chris felt him slip his belt around the opposite side of his waist, reality began to set in rather palpably. There was something about that interest traveling lower that represented a whole new frontier, and one that filled him even further with nervousness. When Midge's hands returned, as a matter of course, for the button and zipper of his jeans, he opened his eyes at last and grabbed him by his wrists, as if to say, "not yet."

"Sorry--is everything okay?" asked Midge, returning briefly to the state of apologetic caution Chris had witnessed earlier, but nearly forgotten by now, absorbed in passion and pleasure. 

"Yeah, it's just…this is my...I've not done this before, so…"

"I assumed that," he replied with a barely suppressed chuckle. "Don't worry about it," he whispered, leaning in again, "you're doing fine."

Midge went for his fly again, just like before, but this time, uninterrupted. But he refused to reach inside, opting instead to tease Chris's erection from outside, through the material. He traced it with a finger before half-gripping it in the palm of his hand, working it back and forth, slowly to start. Taken by surprise yet again, Chris sucked air through his teeth, felt his face flush even worse than before, and almost felt a bit light-headed. Midge stopped as quickly as he'd begun, raising two open hands in the universal gesture of "no harm." "Too much for you?"

How could one be prideful in a moment like this? "Well, maybe…" answered Chris, embarrassed but sincerely overwhelmed.

"Well, you give me a minute to get comfortable, and then you won't feel so bad," suggested Midge, maintaining a teasing air despite having been so bold. He got up from the bed, casually stretching his back--again, as if he owned the place--before peeling off his own sweater, and a sweat-soaked undershirt that hadn't left much to the imagination to begin with. Even though Chris hadn't exactly undressed him with his eyes beforehand, his appearance comported with what one might have expected, seeing him fully clothed...yes, he was a bit short, as Warren had taken much mirth in pointing out all night, but he was a stocky kind of short, with broad shoulders and a bit of a barrel chest, decorated with a small, but hopelessly beguiling, tuft of reddish brown hair in the middle. The oft-covered regions of his skin were a shade even lighter than his face and hands, though just barely, with a finer, more pearly quality in the light. Midge made short work of his own belt and, completely shamelessly, did away with his own trousers as well as underwear in one fell swoop, having left his clunky and apparently uncomfortable boots by the door when he came in. Yes, he was human indeed. Yet another thing Chris hadn't anticipated--for the first time in his life, he had a completely naked man standing in front of him, baring it all just for his viewing pleasure, and yet more so than anything else on display for him, his eyes were drawn almost entirely to Midge's face. His smile wasn't just confident, but it was also sincere, friendly, and radiated trust. He was about as vulnerable as could be, around someone he'd essentially just met, and seemed pretty pleased with himself. At this point, Chris was hardly sure if it was lust or envy.

Still smiling, seemingly without a care in the world, he strolled back over towards Chris and pulled him up off the bed, dragging him into another kiss. This time, he was in full control, guiding the tilt of Chris's face with one hand, pushing down the waistband of those jeans he'd been so cagey about with the other. The cold air hitting his hard-on embarrassed Chris all over again, as bad as anything had all night. Talk about vulnerability. When Midge's hand moved towards it again, he nearly flinched back from the touch, despite how much he was beginning to crave it. He felt forced to break away from the kiss, just about gasping for air by now.

At long last, another man's hand was clenched around his cock, working him up and down, steady but slow. It felt intoxicating, and after so much teasing buildup, borderline rapturous. He could feel arm hair and the veins in the back of Midge's hand tickling his stomach--that pervasive sense of the masculine that changed every little detail of the body into one exotic and intense in its distinction. If Chris moaned or sighed or groaned in response to that touch, it happened somewhere in his mind, or in his soul, that he didn't truly have any control over.

Feeling weak in the knees, he limply pushed himself away, just enough to give himself room to sit back down on the edge of the bed. While a part of him worried about seeming disinterested, Midge seemed to gleefully absorb the fact that he was indeed enjoying himself. He knelt down in front of him, wedging his way between Chris's bony knees, and still gazing at him with that adoring smile. "May I?" he asked, looking puckish, glancing at his eager cock, and resting his arms on Chris's thighs.

Chris nodded vigorously, leaning back in preparation. The second Midge wrapped his lips around him there, he knew he didn't have much time left. He felt that darling tongue wrapping itself all around him, and those perfect lips moving forward and back, accepting him, enveloping him in a totally unfamiliar, yet radiant and vivid, embrace of affection. Hardly a few moments passed, but it felt to him like an eternity of yellow fire. His consciousness momentarily eradicated, the last thought left to smolder in his mind was that lovely smile, the last thing he'd seen before he closed his eyes again. 

Chris was even more exhausted now than he was when they arrived home. After indulging himself for a few moments, he forced himself to sit upright, to avoid falling asleep. Midge had crawled into bed next to him, once again, as if he owned the place, lying back with a dreamy look of satisfaction and pride in what he'd achieved. A furtive glance downward showed that he was far from down for the count. He seemed to hold liquor impressively well.

"Thank you," Chris muttered, "but I think at this point, I owe you one, don't I?" It was his best attempt to sound sexy and coquettish, though he worried it wasn't the most convincing.

"No need to thank me--I probably had as much fun as you did. But, sure, do your worst," he replied, shifting from side to a more "accessible" position on his back. 

Chris straddled over his thighs, marveling, in the back of his mind, at how sturdy and well-built his legs were. All night, he'd been shyly averting his gaze from Midge's crotch, as if not looking straight at it would make it magically disappear. There was no flinching now, though, with it poised right in front of his face, practically gleaming in a verdant thatch of dark hair...he couldn't help but think his was easier on the eyes than his own, perhaps thicker or more symmetrical or something. That nagging envy again. 

Accepting the fact that there was no turning back now, Chris started tentatively working on him with his hand, simple moves like he'd have used on himself. He wondered briefly if Midge even realized that he was left-handed, but seeing the way he seemed to enjoy being stroked made him quickly abandon the question. Even tired and spent, he was turned on beyond belief at the low grunts he could get out of him. 

Spurred on with a renewed sense of passion, he hunkered down, at last, for a taste. Midge reached out his hand towards his cheek again, that signature move that was already becoming so comforting, so anchoring. The leather strap of his watch grazed Chris's face, and he nearly shuddered--had he really been wearing that this entire time? Well, there was no time to nitpick things like that now. Still slightly hesitant, Chris planted some kisses on the shaft before working himself up to lick him up and down with his tongue. He proved much too tempting; Midge guided his face exactly where he wanted it, and just about pressed him down into his own cock. It was a lot to take in, and not just in a literal sense, but the excitement of the moment dissipated nearly all of his insecurities. Closing his eyes again, Chris leaned into the act, too impassioned to worry about much more than avoiding his teeth--and even that, a bit imperfectly. But all the enthusiasm in the world couldn't render him immune to the awkward position of his jaw, which was starting to wear on him--rookie error. 

Gasping for air one last time, he quickly got the jump on exactly where he left off, this time with his left hand again. And with his eyes open, he watched a man sigh, moan, and convulse at nothing more than his fingertips, for the first time in his life. Not to mention make a mess all over his own stomach. 

Midge collected himself and washed up in the restroom, whose location he thankfully seemed to remember. Chris had just about had enough of his long (though thoroughly enjoyed) night, but before drifting into the deeper end of sleep, he noticed Midge hitting the lights himself, and curling up in bed beside him, for the first of a great many times. The last thing Chris would remember of this night was getting one firm squeeze on his ass, just as he was drifting off for good. He figured it must have meant, "thank you."


End file.
